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[redangel]

Hi all
I have a 10 year old male African Grey, who goes by the name of Gizmo (Gizzy, Pip, Beautiful Boy), which ever he chooses to use!!!
I assume he is male, when I bought him at 12 weeks old, the breeder said he was male, so I've just taken that as read. Throughout his life he has always preferred females, so I just took that as another sign he was male.
He used to be great friends with my Dad, but after the first time Giz bit him, my Dad never went near him again. So I was basically his primary carer and entertainer from him being about 8 months old.
In hindsight my family home was not the best place to put a young bird into, my Dad always having to be the alpha male, and shouting to get his point across, and my mum obsessed with cleanliness (you can't be obsessed with cleanliness when you have a parrot around!).
From about 2 years old Gizmo feathered plucked. So that was around the last time he flew properly.
3 years ago, I moved into a house share with a group of people. They have tried their hardest to make Gizmo like them. And he now has bags of confidence, and will take food from all of them, and be picked up by each of them.
The problem lies with Craig, the only male housemate. Craig has tried the hardest with Gizmo. Gizmo copies everything Craig says, and whistles, "mummy is special" being one of his favourites (and I thought Craig was my friend!). He takes food from Craig, sits on Craig's lap while he tickles his head. However, it is very hit and miss as to whether he is going to be friendly to Craig, or bite him. I'm very good at reading Gizmo's body language, and have taught Craig the signs to look out for if he is going to bite. The full feathers, eye pinning etc. However, Gizmo is very good at giving off mixed signals, putting his head down, saying "tickle" even rolling over for Craig, and then taking a lump out of his hand, when Craig goes to tickle.
Gizmo is obviously happy where we are living because he has allowed his feathers to grow back, and is on the verge of flying again. He can land and take off, but can't keep himself up for long, so I think he just needs to get his muscle back again.
My main concern is what is going to happen when Giz learns to fly properly. He won't have to wait for someone to approach him before he attacks, he'll be able to do it at will. So I really need some advice on training him again, and what to do to stop the pretence of "I love you", before he attacks!
I must stress that he never attacks me, or the females in the house, just Craig.

[Karmen]

Hi,

What you describe is actually pretty normal behaviour for a parrot - unpredictable. It is great that he gets along with everyone in the household, including Craig (despite his occational nips). He sounds well socialised.

You can start training your parrot now already to stay on a perch/playstand when outside of his cage. Get him accustomed to it now so that when he starts to fly, he has already grown used to his perch.

Once he starts to fly, you can teach him to fly to you on command, holding your arm out and command him to fly back to his perch. If you condition him into this type of routine and reward him for it, he will less likely just randomly fly around and attack people. Basically you need to establish a training routine for him. Have a look at Pat's videos in the training section. There is one where she taught Charlie to fetch a penny. That is the type of training you need to do once he starts to fly

[Greg Glendell]

Hi Redangel,
It would be very frustrating to ask a bird to stay inone place for long against its will; they need tobe able to move around by flying.
So, using reward-based training, and once the bird's flying skills are good, I would teach the following requests:

A 'Stop' request; meaning do not approach me for now
A 'Go' request, meaning fly off me and go to another place/cage / perch etc.
'On here' to ask him to come/fly to you. 
'Off there' to ask him to leave his current perch and fly to another one. 

This is what I teach my birds and it works quite well. 

Craig just needs to know *and use* the 'Stop' request, and/or leave the room if the bird attempts to approach him. 

Good luck, and keep him flying; flying birds are more resistant to self-plucking!